Re:Unfounded Criticism
on
iPods at War
·
· Score: 1
Our troops aren't just fighting for Democracy, they're also fighting for stable economies & developed infrastructures.
I think there are entire essays that could be written in response to this so very American comment, a lot of them centering on the words 'oil' and 'selfish interests', but that would be quite offtopic.
Instead, I agree with you, naturally, that soldiers should have comfort, but FFS, there are limits. Take your ipod, your DVD player, your game consoles, that's all fine. Have good food, have good drinks, that's fine too. But Christ, a frigging complete DJ studio just so you can mix new beats while you should be catching up on some sleep? Sure, they should have television, I would consider that essential with the news being compulsory viewing for everyone - but does it have to be a $3000 Plasma Screen TV??? A Kingsize bed - what for? All those Iraqi women you're anticipating?? None of those provide what you might consider essential comfort, that's just pure, unneccesary indulgence.
In other words, 13cm is less than 5.24 inches. So stop worrying, you can build a (probably slotloading) drive around it that will fit into your PC. They managed years ago with floppies too, well before anyone even thought about perhaps building a CD drive.
Well, to be completely pedantic, the best Cognac is made only from crus from the Grande and the Petite Champagne (with at least 50% coming from the former), which may lead some people to believe that Cognac is related to Champagne. But you are right of course, the sparkling wine Champagne comes from a completely different region of France (called Champagne, funnily enough) and Cognac has absolutely nothing to do with it.
Also, Cognac is not to grapes as cider is to apples, so the AC has no point anyway.
yup, seconded. At the moment, Ubuntu is definitely the way to go. And just so I'm not completely offtopic, Freespire is actually based on debian, just like Ubuntu.
Never the less, liquid armour sounds cool, can I have it in my motorbike kit? Lighter, more flexible armour that resists penetration can only make landing in a hedge that little bit safer.
Yeah, it might stop you from gettign impaled on that fence. I wouldn't count on it stopping you from doing bendy things like breaking your back or neck though.
Well, let's see... apologies in advance for getting the numbers wrong, I always mess up my conversions (but it doesn't matter as you'll see at the end). But 5 Mb = 5 242 880 bytes = 41 943 040 bits (that is assuming I got it right)
Now, I don't know exactly what sort of resolution you had on punch cards, but it's probably fair to assume that, including padding, a centimeter squared would do per bit. so you need 41 943 040 cm^2 = 4 194.304 square meters of punch cards. Now say, just for the sake of the argument, that your punch cards are 30x 30 = 900cm^2, you would need 46 603.3777.... of them. And then it all boils down to how thin your punch cards can be, but just intuitively, I'd say, yeah, you can easily fill up that space with 5Mb worth of punch cards.
But then again, you are missing the entire point. Punch cards are not rewritable, hard disks are and that is the innovative bit. So it doesn't matter whether or not you can put punch cards in that space, it's all about being able to reuse said space.
AFAIK, digging up information on a willing person and presenting isn't illegal.
That depends entirely on where you go digging and how you go digging. The person on whom you're finding information might be ok with it, the people whose systems you've broken into to do so won't be.
You're laughing, but in practice I have too often seen restrictions on the maximal security of passwords. Take for instance my online banking system (which in its defense has other security measures alongside the password, but still):
no more than 10 characters please
upper/or lowercase does not matter, lowercase will automatically be converted to uppercase
alphanumeric characters only
Seriously, what's the point of this?? Why am I forced to use weak passwords just because some developper somewhere can't figure out how to allow a " or a \ in a string?
Well, someone clearly has enough problems with the undead to mod you insightful.... thank God you stopped them from trying this tip on their enemies... you may have saved many lives!
The solution to that is, of course, rm -- * with -- generally being a good idea if you have filenames with a leading - in your directory as it tells any command that whatever follows should not be seen as a command option.
But that's the kind of thing you only ever find out about afterwards;)
As with any source, especially those of unknown authorship, you should be wary and independently verify the accuracy of Wikipedia information if possible; see also Caution on academic use of Wikipedia and our General Disclaimer page.
Also, the first thing they teach you at University is that, although you can cite webpages, it will generally be frowned upon and should be avoided at all costs.
I would think the hardware in the case is more important for a gamer.
Nonono, you're approaching this from the wrong angle. Think about it this way - gamers are young males, probably not getting out enough, so this is all about impressing potential girlfriends. Honestly.
Scenario A: Girl enters room. Standard beige box and chunky CRT are the dominant features. Girl: In your bedroom? You've gotta be kidding. *goes home* Gamer:.... *sobs*
Scenario B: Girl enters room. Glowing... thingy and shiny LCD are clearly noticeable. Girl: What are those? Gamer: That's my flatscreen television and my mood lighting device, baby. It can cycle through very mellow sensual colours. Wanna cuddle for a bit and dream of beautiful memories... together? Girl: Awwww.... *melts into gamers arms*
So you see, nothing at all to do with games. Beware of cases that don't do warm soft-glow red or pink though..... arctic chill blue does not incite to undress.
Once a base is set up, some of that water can be broken down, releasing oxygen.
Oh, absolutely not. That is a very silly idea for two reasons. One, you will need every droplet of water you can get. Have you learnt nothing from the droughts that even England (of all places!) manages to suffer from? Two, if you are going to transport a X litres of water up there just to break it down into oxygen, you might as well be efficient and transport X liters of compressed oxygen instead. Why bother with all the hydrogen if you're only interested in the O2?
As for your idea, which is essentially setting up a completely self-contained biosphere within the lunar base so that nothing needs to be imported - it is, of course, extremely sensible.
It also only really addresses the problems of the initial transportation costs if you're a creationist, because then there is prior evidence that such a system can be set up in seven days flat (you might even have time to rest at the end).
If you're not a creationist however, then you have to face the fact that you will have to import a lot of stuff for a long period of time before you are self-contained. And until you and I can book a holiday with Virgin Galactic without having to sell our Firstborn, flying stuff to the moon will be prohibitively expensive, so anything you can do to save some space in your luggage (like mining the local oxygen instead of bringing your own) is a very good idea indeed.
Well, from TFA: "This was caused by something as seemingly harmless as a missing closing parenthesis"
So no, it is indeed just a closing paranthesis that is missing. Why exactly that bloke considered this 'seemingly harmless', I don't know though... that is rather like saying "The car crash was caused by something as seemingly harmless as a severed brakeline."
So, let's see, it's a glorified white-list relying on a central server and a dedicated email client. Ignoring the fact that we already have white lists (they don't work) and that a dedicated email client is a silly idea (you still have to cater for everyone who doesn't want to use it (e.g. spammers), so it's useless), how exactly do you imagine that central server thing working? Specifically, what happens if the server goes down? Email stops working? Or does your anti-spam system stop working? I bet it's the latter. It better not be the former!
Oh well.
The one good thing about your system then would be that the time and duration of the DDOS attacks against your server will give interesting statistics about when spammers like to send their crap out.
I don't know if there is a solution to spam, but this isn't it. (It just occurred to me that finding a solution to spam is NP. I need to get out more.)
Nanos were made to have smaller capacity because Apple weren't selling a good balance of Minis and normal iPods.
I'd say the capacity of the Nano has more to do with the flash memory than with any marketing goals. Flash memory is expensive and doesn't come in large-capacity flavours. Once it becomes cheaper and comes in higher capacities, you can bet that there will be higher-capacity Nanos out.
if they increase the storage capacity it gives people less incentive to buy a more expensive regular iPod.
Precisley. Which is why the regular iPods will be phased out, save perhaps for some large-screen video iPod. After all, why would I want a hard disk based mp3 player if I can have a solid state one with the same capacity for the same price? Hard disk players are going to die out, it's inevitable. Regular iPods won't be an exception.
I suppose it makes sense for linux/ *BSD fanboys who absolutely swear by their distribution, but need Windows for gaming and are considering giving OSX a shot. Or maybe they just need Windows for gaming and OSX for Photoshop or Garageband, but will do anything else under linux.
Also, I suppose a lot of *nix programs which haven't been specifically ported to OSX will be easier to compile/install and run under a pure linux/BSD system.
Thirdly, if you're normally a linux user, but nicked the Windows version of Mathematica and the OSX version of Photoshop from your Uni/workplace, you'll also need the 3 OSes:)
I'm in a mood to be pedantic, but it does play in your favour:) If Apples are allegedly 60% more expensive then PCs, it is wrong to ask to see a PC which is 60% cheaper than a Mac. In fact, you need a PC which is 62.5% cheaper.
Example: PC costs 1000$, Apple is 60% more expensive, so it costs 1600$.
60% of 1600 = 960 so that's not enough to get back to the initial value of 1000 62.5 *(1600/100) = 1000 so you see, you need 62.5%, not 60%
Global warming is about as solid a theory as the Earth going around the Sun.
Well, duh. The point you forget in your trolling (but you can forgiven for the negligence since many people on either side of the argument do just the same thing) is that, big surprise, the earth is not a static place, it is in its nature to change. There's little ice ages every now end then, there's big ones every couple of little ones, and so on. So, big surprise, sometimes the planet gets warmer, sometimes it gets colder. That's a fact. But that's not the issue, the issue is, how much of this is influenced by man. And that is a much harder question to answer.
Saying that global warming (or the potentially resulting cooling) is due to man alone is like saying that it's warmer in the summer because cows get out more and fart more. It certainly is warmer in the summer than in the winter, but if the cows have anything to do with it is an entirely different question. But who knows, they might increase an effect that's already there. Then again, they might not. I don't know. And neither do you.
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Instead, I agree with you, naturally, that soldiers should have comfort, but FFS, there are limits. Take your ipod, your DVD player, your game consoles, that's all fine. Have good food, have good drinks, that's fine too. But Christ, a frigging complete DJ studio just so you can mix new beats while you should be catching up on some sleep? Sure, they should have television, I would consider that essential with the news being compulsory viewing for everyone - but does it have to be a $3000 Plasma Screen TV??? A Kingsize bed - what for? All those Iraqi women you're anticipating?? None of those provide what you might consider essential comfort, that's just pure, unneccesary indulgence.
In other words, 13cm is less than 5.24 inches. So stop worrying, you can build a (probably slotloading) drive around it that will fit into your PC. They managed years ago with floppies too, well before anyone even thought about perhaps building a CD drive.
Because you evidently have a thing for overspending on unnecessary yet overpriced things? :)
Well, to be completely pedantic, the best Cognac is made only from crus from the Grande and the Petite Champagne (with at least 50% coming from the former), which may lead some people to believe that Cognac is related to Champagne. But you are right of course, the sparkling wine Champagne comes from a completely different region of France (called Champagne, funnily enough) and Cognac has absolutely nothing to do with it.
Also, Cognac is not to grapes as cider is to apples, so the AC has no point anyway.
yup, seconded. At the moment, Ubuntu is definitely the way to go. And just so I'm not completely offtopic, Freespire is actually based on debian, just like Ubuntu.
Yeah, it might stop you from gettign impaled on that fence. I wouldn't count on it stopping you from doing bendy things like breaking your back or neck though.
Well, let's see... apologies in advance for getting the numbers wrong, I always mess up my conversions (but it doesn't matter as you'll see at the end).
But 5 Mb = 5 242 880 bytes = 41 943 040 bits (that is assuming I got it right)
Now, I don't know exactly what sort of resolution you had on punch cards, but it's probably fair to assume that, including padding, a centimeter squared would do per bit. so you need 41 943 040 cm^2 = 4 194.304 square meters of punch cards. Now say, just for the sake of the argument, that your punch cards are 30x 30 = 900cm^2, you would need 46 603.3777.... of them. And then it all boils down to how thin your punch cards can be, but just intuitively, I'd say, yeah, you can easily fill up that space with 5Mb worth of punch cards.
But then again, you are missing the entire point. Punch cards are not rewritable, hard disks are and that is the innovative bit. So it doesn't matter whether or not you can put punch cards in that space, it's all about being able to reuse said space.
Nah man, this has evolution written all over it ;)
That depends entirely on where you go digging and how you go digging. The person on whom you're finding information might be ok with it, the people whose systems you've broken into to do so won't be.
Take for instance my online banking system (which in its defense has other security measures alongside the password, but still):
Seriously, what's the point of this?? Why am I forced to use weak passwords just because some developper somewhere can't figure out how to allow a " or a \ in a string?
Well, someone clearly has enough problems with the undead to mod you insightful.... thank God you stopped them from trying this tip on their enemies... you may have saved many lives!
The solution to that is, of course, rm -- * with -- generally being a good idea if you have filenames with a leading - in your directory as it tells any command that whatever follows should not be seen as a command option. But that's the kind of thing you only ever find out about afterwards ;)
Also, the first thing they teach you at University is that, although you can cite webpages, it will generally be frowned upon and should be avoided at all costs.
There is no cube.
When you realise this, you will see that it is not the cube that gets solved. It is only yourself.
Honestly.
Scenario A: Girl enters room. Standard beige box and chunky CRT are the dominant features.
Girl: In your bedroom? You've gotta be kidding. *goes home*
Gamer:
Scenario B: Girl enters room. Glowing... thingy and shiny LCD are clearly noticeable.
Girl: What are those?
Gamer: That's my flatscreen television and my mood lighting device, baby. It can cycle through very mellow sensual colours. Wanna cuddle for a bit and dream of beautiful memories... together?
Girl: Awwww.... *melts into gamers arms*
So you see, nothing at all to do with games. Beware of cases that don't do warm soft-glow red or pink though..... arctic chill blue does not incite to undress.
One, you will need every droplet of water you can get. Have you learnt nothing from the droughts that even England (of all places!) manages to suffer from?
Two, if you are going to transport a X litres of water up there just to break it down into oxygen, you might as well be efficient and transport X liters of compressed oxygen instead. Why bother with all the hydrogen if you're only interested in the O2?
As for your idea, which is essentially setting up a completely self-contained biosphere within the lunar base so that nothing needs to be imported - it is, of course, extremely sensible.
It also only really addresses the problems of the initial transportation costs if you're a creationist, because then there is prior evidence that such a system can be set up in seven days flat (you might even have time to rest at the end).
If you're not a creationist however, then you have to face the fact that you will have to import a lot of stuff for a long period of time before you are self-contained. And until you and I can book a holiday with Virgin Galactic without having to sell our Firstborn, flying stuff to the moon will be prohibitively expensive, so anything you can do to save some space in your luggage (like mining the local oxygen instead of bringing your own) is a very good idea indeed.
Well, from TFA: "This was caused by something as seemingly harmless as a missing closing parenthesis"
So no, it is indeed just a closing paranthesis that is missing. Why exactly that bloke considered this 'seemingly harmless', I don't know though... that is rather like saying "The car crash was caused by something as seemingly harmless as a severed brakeline."
So, let's see, it's a glorified white-list relying on a central server and a dedicated email client. Ignoring the fact that we already have white lists (they don't work) and that a dedicated email client is a silly idea (you still have to cater for everyone who doesn't want to use it (e.g. spammers), so it's useless), how exactly do you imagine that central server thing working? Specifically, what happens if the server goes down? Email stops working? Or does your anti-spam system stop working? I bet it's the latter. It better not be the former!
Oh well.
The one good thing about your system then would be that the time and duration of the DDOS attacks against your server will give interesting statistics about when spammers like to send their crap out.
I don't know if there is a solution to spam, but this isn't it. (It just occurred to me that finding a solution to spam is NP. I need to get out more.)
Precisley. Which is why the regular iPods will be phased out, save perhaps for some large-screen video iPod. After all, why would I want a hard disk based mp3 player if I can have a solid state one with the same capacity for the same price? Hard disk players are going to die out, it's inevitable. Regular iPods won't be an exception.
Oh, and cross-platform developpers will naturally be happy. One machine, 3 systems.
I suppose it makes sense for linux/ *BSD fanboys who absolutely swear by their distribution, but need Windows for gaming and are considering giving OSX a shot. Or maybe they just need Windows for gaming and OSX for Photoshop or Garageband, but will do anything else under linux.
:)
Also, I suppose a lot of *nix programs which haven't been specifically ported to OSX will be easier to compile/install and run under a pure linux/BSD system.
Thirdly, if you're normally a linux user, but nicked the Windows version of Mathematica and the OSX version of Photoshop from your Uni/workplace, you'll also need the 3 OSes
I'm in a mood to be pedantic, but it does play in your favour :)
:)
If Apples are allegedly 60% more expensive then PCs, it is wrong to ask to see a PC which is 60% cheaper than a Mac. In fact, you need a PC which is 62.5% cheaper.
Example:
PC costs 1000$, Apple is 60% more expensive, so it costs 1600$.
60% of 1600 = 960 so that's not enough to get back to the initial value of 1000
62.5 *(1600/100) = 1000 so you see, you need 62.5%, not 60%
Told you I'm just being pedantic
Well, duh. The point you forget in your trolling (but you can forgiven for the negligence since many people on either side of the argument do just the same thing) is that, big surprise, the earth is not a static place, it is in its nature to change. There's little ice ages every now end then, there's big ones every couple of little ones, and so on. So, big surprise, sometimes the planet gets warmer, sometimes it gets colder. That's a fact. But that's not the issue, the issue is, how much of this is influenced by man. And that is a much harder question to answer.
Saying that global warming (or the potentially resulting cooling) is due to man alone is like saying that it's warmer in the summer because cows get out more and fart more. It certainly is warmer in the summer than in the winter, but if the cows have anything to do with it is an entirely different question. But who knows, they might increase an effect that's already there. Then again, they might not. I don't know. And neither do you.